racketboy.com

Ok, so you may have seen my Wii2HDMI thread which is related, but separate, but also just about as frustrating
viewtopic.php?f=2&t=51847

However my main issue is that my living room setup that has been stable and functioning for nearly 5 years is, in the last few months fallen apart.

I had the Wii Composite feeding to a Denon AVR-1912 receiver and converting to HDMI to my Vizio E320-A1 Display.

Like I mentioned before, this was all working great for years (granted, there was a year or two where the Wii didn't get as much activity)

About a month or two ago, my wife started noticing that there would be more "black" screen time in between level transitions and such on New Super Mario Bros. It wasn't too bad at first, but then it started lasting 5 to 10 seconds each. I could see that the display was showing a resolution switch for some reason and I figured I'd order a Wii2HDMI to give me more options. For Christmas, we got my son Super Mario Galaxy and the resolution switching/lag time was unbearable from the start. I ended up bringing up our old CRT to put on the living room floor so the poor boy could play (the TV console is not sturdy enough for the weight).

I've tried playing with the Wii resolution options and it hasn't helped. When I tried again today, I noticed even selecting certain channels on the Wii dashboard would trigger it and even going into "Settings" made it go to 720p and never come back from the black.

Here's a video so you can see my pain
https://youtu.be/MSGgtmjcKp0

Any thoughts or recommendations?

First off the Wii looks a gazillion times better on a 4:3 CRT than any HD tv. I understand that for ease of use and your current setup that is not a viable option so here is what I did to make it look good on my Panasonic Plasma and my LG LCD - I turned off the feature to detected resolution. The problem with the Panasonic (10 yrs old) was that if I set the component to 480 it forced everything to 480. The LG (2 yrs old) allows me to keep the component set at 480 and the FireStick/cable box to switch between 720 and 1080 depending on the content. If that doesn't work I have also found turning off 16:9 and forcing 4:3 sometimes will force it to stay in 480 at the cost of losing the widescreen functions of some games.

Any reason you do not want to use component cables? Seems your tv is having a fit displaying the Wii over HDMI.

I haven’t ruled it out, but I’m starting to feel like this box is becoming a money sink.

Also, I have gone though all the settings on the TV and receiver and nothing seems to help.

You can get a refurbished WiiU at Gamstop now for just a little over $100:

https://www.gamestop.com/wii-u/consoles ... ite/129110

In addition to allowing you to play WiiU games, the console will also let you play Wii games over HDMI.

prfsnl_gmr wrote:You can get a refurbished WiiU at Gamstop now for just a little over $100:

https://www.gamestop.com/wii-u/consoles ... ite/129110

In addition to allowing you to play WiiU games, the console will also let you play Wii games over HDMI.

Which was one of my first thoughts, but you lose GameCube support (including controllers) right?

racketboy wrote:

prfsnl_gmr wrote:You can get a refurbished WiiU at Gamstop now for just a little over $100:

https://www.gamestop.com/wii-u/consoles ... ite/129110

In addition to allowing you to play WiiU games, the console will also let you play Wii games over HDMI.

Which was one of my first thoughts, but you lose GameCube support (including controllers) right?

Sadly, yes...

Yeah, don't even bother with an HDTV. Get component cables and use a CRT. Even on Wii U's vWii through HDMI, it doesn't look particularly great. 480p just doesn't look great on an HDTV.

Well, keep in mind, this is a modest living room with a single TV in the corner. It is mostly used to watch Netflix and other content via an Apple TV (which just get scrunched down as designed for widescreen). The furniture also won't hold the CRT I have. We tried it and I would fear it would collapse when either my 2 or 4 year old were playing around it.

So please don't give me best-case scenarios -- this is trying to make the most of what I have to deal with without having to spend a bunch more money.

It kinda sucks as I just picked up a handful of cheap but interesting Wii titles for the kids and my wife. A couple are even these "Active" titles put out by Namco and use one of those old-style pads you run on -- both those need the Gamecube ports!

The Wii was supposed to be the cheap and easy console to have upstairs for the family as it supported a wide range of Wii and Gamecube games.

Anyway.... I'll circle back to this since people seem to be overlooking
This exact setup was functioning fine for years. Now it seems to be degrading rapidly. I'm curious as to why that is and what I can do about it.

Sorry if I'm getting a little blunt here, but having to have a CRT on the floor in my small living room for over a week is getting kinda old...

Gotcha. If a CRT is out of the question, a Wii U outputting HDMI is going to be your best best for an HDTV. If you really want the Gamecube support, then a Wii with component cables (assuming your TV has a component input) would be your best blend of quality and reliability.